By Melik Kaylan
Putin is at an impasse — on many levels. Let's consider the severity of his condition, possible developments, and possible timelines.
Crimea's access to fuel has effectively been cut off due to repeated Ukrainian drone attacks. The image of a queue of many kilometers with cars attempting to leave the peninsula at the peak of the tourist season creates a bad impression. The Russians have one last channel for supplying Crimea with fuel: the Kerch Bridge – a symbolic architectural project, which has been bombed many times but still stands standing. Tankers crossing it can be an easy target, causing a huge fire in case they are hit. My sources within the Ukrainian secret services tell me that such a large-scale attack is imminent.
We all know how the situation has changed in the war in Ukraine, but the image projected has the same importance as the reality on the ground. When disasters occur so severe that neither Putin nor the Russian public can ignore them, reality itself changes. The whole adventure in Ukraine will appear as a disaster. Putin cannot avoid defamation. Indeed, when he cannot control the image projected, the effect multiplies exponentially and time begins to count down to Putin's detriment. A loss of credibility leads to a loss of legitimacy in an authoritarian regime.
A Russian military blogger, Aleksandr Lunin, a veteran of the invasion of Ukraine, recently published a video in which he warned of mutiny and asked for a personal television interview with Putin. He spoke of secrets that had been revealed to him by senior officers and which he had to pass on to Putin. According to the latest count, the video had 11 million views. This was followed by another video in which Lunin appeared more moderate, but this was immediately followed by a video of support from a group of soldiers who threatened to turn their guns on the officers who were torturing them. Lunin is now in prison. Prigozhin's mutiny comes to the minds of citizens.
Videos of Ukrainian attacks on military and energy facilities are constantly circulating, both near Moscow and in remote areas of Russia. Everywhere we see women with great influence on social networks crying because they can't find gasoline for their cars. At the same time, videos of men on the streets of Russia being forcibly recruited are circulating. Often, their relatives try to block the vehicles of their "kidnappers". "Why don't the enforcers of the law themselves serve at the fronts?" is the question that arises.
Let us not forget that, historically, regime change and the collapse of the Moscow Empire have occurred twice in the last century due to disastrous military campaigns – World War I and the invasion of Afghanistan.
As the pressure on Putin intensifies, the elites around him are pondering their own fate and finding people - like Aleksandr Lunin - to express their fears. The people conclude either that Putin is responsible for the situation or that the elites around him are isolating him from realizing and fixing things. First, the elites will be blamed. That is why the elites will rebel even before the army – out of fear.
From this column we had predicted the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022 a month earlier, as well as the catastrophic outcome for Moscow, when most "experts" and journalists did not see this scenario as possible.
Putin has a number of impeccable defense systems, equivalent to the Praetorian Guard. It has its own units of bodyguards, security forces such as the FSB, the troops of the Ministry of the Interior or the National Guard (Rosgvardia with 300,000 soldiers) and 30,000 direct bodyguards, the police and other similar forces. He has used them and even brought them into conflict with each other over the years. However, each of these forces is also a threat, as the loyalty of each is primarily to its own leader. A civil war between these Russian forces is a scenario that gathers possibilities.
The question of how Putin's end will come depends more on the final outcome that each side seeks. For Putin to be eliminated by summary procedures and for a power struggle to follow means that those loyal to the Russian president will not have time to react. In this case, however, the possibility of setting up a mock trial and condemning Putin as a scapegoat for all the ills of his rule is lost, exonerating all those still responsible for them. This allows the system and its elites to stay in place and cause the least amount of chaos possible. Such a development could be described as a "Ceausescu choice". With the fall of the Eastern bloc, the notorious Romanian authoritarian leader was executed (along with his wife) by the top military leadership, while his former elites continued to run the country under a nominally democratic system.
The circulation of such scenarios is a threat. A characteristic indication is the mysterious death of Sergei Ivanov, Putin's ally and friend for years, on June 26 at the age of 73. Ivanov was considered the most likely successor to the Russian president. He was the personality at the top of the Russian leadership pyramid who enjoyed such power and impunity that he dared to criticize Moscow's handling from time to time. The Kremlin announced Ivanov's death without giving a cause of death. Ivanov, a close associate of Putin from the 1970s onwards, was removed from official power several times but remained closely associated with the FSB.
Such incidents create a problem for Putin. As potential opponents go "out of action" without a trial, some will feel endangered and will move against the Russian president as a precaution. With paranoia widening around him, anything could spark the end: Ukraine's most innocuous attacks on Moscow, food shortages, any separatist uprisings in provinces such as Tatarstan, Bashkortostan or Chechnya, a Ukrainian invasion of Crimea. Above all, China's actions. If Beijing decides that Putin, as a weakened leader, is an obstacle to its own interests, it can cause his downfall in several ways: by cutting off military aid, by invading Siberia. As things stand, China is significantly limiting its aid to the Russian economy. It has already refused to finance the "Siberia 2" pipeline, which directly connects Siberia with China.
Putin's power has an expiration date. If the course of events continues in the same way or worse, Putin may be overthrown within three years.
Forbes
